New Books

Tex-Mex, barbecue, and chili are important aspects of a culinary culture in Texas that has developed organically over many years of trial and error by thousands of remarkable cooks on both sides of the border. Tex-Mex cuisine, a melding of regional American and interior Mexican cooking, has become enormously popular not just in the Lone Star State but nationwide and, increasingly, throughout the world. Although...

The title cloud of Matt Donovan’s A Cloud of Unusual Size and Shape refers to the volcanic eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD that buried the city of Pompeii under twenty feet of ash. It’s no surprise, then, that Donovan found the site of the sacred ruins an inspiration, using their legacy to form the beginning of this extraordinary nonfiction debut. Donovan pursues the image of the cloud throughout these fourteen...

Matt Donovan’s essays are haunted, searching, lyrical, and above all dogged in their ability to conjoin personal history with public history, whether he is investigating... — David Wojahn, author of World Tree

Coming of Age at the End of Nature explores a new kind of environmental writing. This powerful anthology gathers the passionate voices of young writers who have grown up in an environmentally damaged and compromised world. Each contributor has come of age since Bill McKibben foretold the doom of humanity’s ancient relationship with a pristine earth in his prescient 1988 warning of climate change, The End of...

A fine collection of environmental writing in this thoughtful anthology from a 'new generation of fossil fuel freedom fighters'... an earnest compendium... an intelligent... — Starred Review Library Journal

Fiesta San Antonio began in 1891 with a parade, Battle of the Flowers, in honor of the memory of the battles of the Alamo and San Jacinto. Similar in many ways to Mardi Gras, the parade has evolved into a ten-day, annual festival in April with more than 100 colorful and cultural events raising money for nonprofit organizations in San Antonio.
Cornyation has played an important role in the transformation of Fiesta....

Dogs, like humans, have memories, instincts, fears, and loyalties. But as far as we know, dogs do not get swept up in nostalgia, speculation, or self-analysis. Although they have hopes, they are not driven by regrets. In Crossing the Plains with Bruno, Annick Smith weaves together a memoir of travel and relationship, western history and family history, human love and animal love centering around a two-week road trip...

Annick Smith invites a chocolate Labrador retriever named Bruno to hop up into her Toyota 4Runner for a road trip from her home outside Missoula, Mont., to the North Side... — The New York Times Book Review

In Death Watch, National Book Award–winning poet Gerald Stern uses powerful prose to sift through personal and prophetic history and contemplate his own mortality. Characteristically audacious, uncompromising, funny, and iconoclastic, Stern looks back at his life and forward to how his story will play out. Wrestling with his identity in Judaism, he explores how his name was uprooted from its origins, as so much of his...

There is no warning as to where Jerry, as his many friends call him, will strike next as he roams about his long and productive life. — Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

When the infant Conrad Netting received his late father’s Air Medal in a military ceremony in February 1945, it seemed to close the book on yet another tragedy of World War II. But what appeared to be closure was only a pause. Katherine Netting became part of the silent generation, speaking little of the deep anguish left by her husband’s death when his fighter plane crashed in Normandy four days after D-Day....

Upon reading the wartime letters of Katherine and Conrad Netting, I was thunderstruck. Theirs was a story unlike anything I had ever encountered before. . . . Netting’s... — Andrew Carroll, editor of War Letters

Dream Song is the story of John Berryman, one of the most gifted poets of a generation that included Elizabeth Bishop, Randall Jarrell, Robert Lowell, and Dylan Thomas. Using Berryman's unpublished letters and poetry, as well as interviews with those who knew him intimately, Paul Mariani captures Berryman's genius and the tragedy that dogged him while also illuminating one of the most provocative periods in American...

The ups and downs of Berryman's fascinating, excruciating life are beautifully retold. . . . A scrupulous, sensitive biography that is full of pity and wonder, that... — USA Today

The enchilada is more than an everyday Mexican food. It is a history of Mexico—rolled, folded, and flat—that embodies thousands of years of Mexican life. The evolving ingredients in enchiladas from pre-Columbian to modern times reveal the internal and external forces that have shaped Mexico’s cuisine and culture.Enchiladas: Aztec to Tex-Mex is a comprehensive exploration of one of Mexico’s most historic and popular...

Enchiladas: Aztec to Tex-Mex has legs — it could essentially help spread the gospel of enchiladas callejeras, or Tex-Mex, across the country. — San Antonio Current

The incomparable Rebecca Solnit, author of more than a dozen acclaimed, prizewinning books of nonfiction, brings her dazzling writing to the essays in Encyclopedia of Trouble and Spaciousness. As the title suggests, the territory of Solnit’s concerns is vast, and in her signature alchemical style she combines commentary on history, justice, war and peace, and explorations of place, art, and community, all while...

Solnit has been compared to both Susan Sontag and Annie Dillard, though her writing is more lyrical and oblique than Sontag’s and her engagement with nature more overtly... — BookForum

Writer, teacher, and adventurer Kurt Caswell has spent his adult life canoeing, hiking, and pedaling his way toward a deeper understanding of our vast and varied world. Getting to Grey Owl chronicles over twenty years of Caswell’s travels as he buys a rug in Morocco, rides a riverboat in China, attends a bullfight in Spain, climbs four mountains in the United Kingdom, and backpacks a challenging route through...

Hail of Fire: A Man and His Family Face Natural Disaster is an intimate account of the third worst wildfire in modern U.S. history, and the most destructive in the history of Texas. It is a memoir of what happened to Randy Fritz, an artist turned politician turned public policy leader, and his family during and after the Bastrop County Complex fire in 2011. Combining a searing account of the fire as it grew to...

If you've ever loved a tree—or a person—do yourself a favor: read this book, because at its core love in all its splendor and sadness is what it’s... — Jan Jarboe Russell, author of The Train To Crystal City

With ArteKids, children discover the world of art and learn English and Spanish at the same time. Introduce your child to the fundamentals of shapes by connecting them to the world of art in a unique, fun, and colorful way. The book incorporates artwork found in the collections of the San Antonio Museum of Art, along with phrases and words in English and Spanish, to make bilingual learning and art exciting for eager...

"The art choices are really quite stunning and will engage young readers. . . . The breathtaking works of art give youngsters much to pore over." — Kirkus Reviews

Hailed by book reviewers as a "masterpiece," "gorgeous and fascinating," and "sheer pleasure," Home Ground was published in fall 2006 in hardcover to outstanding reviews. A language lover's dream, this visionary reference is now in its third edition and has revitalized a descriptive language for the American landscape by combining geography, literature, and folklore in one volume.
Have you ever wondered how it came...

Home Ground is a treasure house of a book, chocked with gems of the American vernacular. To learn these terms for features of the landscape is like putting on a new pair... — Michael Pollan, author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma

Gerald Stern has been a significant presence in the literary constellation of his generation and an impassioned and idiosyncratic voice in twentieth- and twenty-first-century American poetry. In this retrospective of Stern's career, fourteen writers, critics, and poets examine the themes, stylistic traits, and craft of a poet who has shaped and inspired American verse for generations. The essays and interviews that...

Gerald Stern is one of those writers whose style insinuates itself into your consciousness like a catchy tune, so that you find your thoughts echoing its rhythms, bopping... — Philadelphia Inquirer

Jane Goodall, who turned eighty on April 3, 2014, is known around the world as a groundbreaking primatologist, the foremost expert on chimpanzees, and a passionate conservationist. In her nearly sixty-year career, Goodall has touched the hearts of millions of people. The Jane Effect is an anthology of testimonies by Goodall’s friends and colleagues honoring her as a scientific pioneer, inspiring teacher, devoted...

Jane Goodall powerfully redefined the way we see our fellow primates. — New York Times

Juan O'Gorman: A Confluence of Civilizations follows O'Gorman's life and the creation of his mural Confluence of Civilizations in the Americas, a spectacular piece of midcentury public art that stands the test of time as one of the Mexican artist's most influential works.
O'Gorman was a muralist, painter, mosaic artist, critic, and professor, as well as an architect. He is possibly best known for his close friendship...

Artist Mark Menjivar was in an antique bookshop in Fort Wayne, Indiana, when he found 4 four-leaf clovers pressed between the yellowed pages of an aged copy of 1000 Facts Worth Knowing. Their discovery piqued Menjivar's curiosity so much that he began a multiyear exploration into the concept of luck and its intersections with belief, culture, superstition, and tradition in people’s lives. Menjivar tells the story...

Menjivar’s project opens up the possibility, if only for a moment, to reflect on our own beliefs and traditions. And more importantly, it opens the potential to connect,... — Glasstire

In this new telling of Mexico’s Second Empire and Louis Napoléon’s installation of Maximilian von Habsburg and his wife, Carlota of Belgium, as the emperor and empress of Mexico, Maximilian and Carlota brings the dramatic and tragic story of this six-year-siege to life.

Authoritative, detailed, and engrossing... McAllen ably demonstrates how the Second Empire’s collapse was one of the most spectacular personal tragedies and political... — Publishers Weekly

With his characteristic genius for finding connections between writing and the stuff of our lives, Peter Turchi ventures into new and even more surprising territory. In A Muse and a Maze, Turchi draws out the similarities between writing and puzzle making and its flip side, puzzle solving. As he teases out how mystery lies at the heart of all storytelling, he uncovers the magic—the creation of credible illusion—that...

Although Turchi’s knack for drawing connections can seem like a sleight of hand in itself, his writing is consistently engaging, lively, and thought provoking. The... — Publishers Weekly

One in a series of reissued books that have been out of print for decades, by one of the most loved naturalists of all time. "A volume for a lifetime" is how the New Yorker described the first of Donald Culross Peattie's two books about American trees published in the 1950s. In this one-volume edition, modern readers are introduced to one of the best nature writers of the last century. As we read Peattie's eloquent...

Peattie's prose is rich and courtly, the botany illuminating. But the chief delight is how he infuses his short portraits of tree species with the history of a nation. — The Denver Post

In this thoughtful, affectionate collection of interviews and letters spanning three decades, beloved poet Gary Snyder talks with South African writer and scholar Julia Martin. Over this period many things changed decisively—globally, locally, and in their personal lives—and these altered conditions provide the backstory for a long conversation. It begins in the early 1980s as an intellectual exchange between an...

In Not So Golden State, environmental historian Char Miller looks below the surface of California’s ecological history to expose some of its less glittering conundrums. In this necessary book, Miller asks tough questions as we stand on the edge of a human-induced natural disaster in the region and beyond. He details policy steps and missteps in public land management, examines recreation's impact on national forests,...

One of the environmental history profession's most thoughtful and astute observers. — Environmental History

Open Midnight weaves two parallel stories about the great wilderness—Brooke Williams’s year alone with his dog, ground truthing backcountry maps of southern Utah, and that of his great-great-great-grandfather, William Williams, who in 1863 made his way with a group of Mormons from England across the ocean and the American wild almost to Utah, dying a week short. The story follows two levels of history—personal, as...

The six stories in Outside showcase Barry Lopez’s superb talent as a fiction writer. They offer profound insight into the relationships between humans and animals, creativity and beauty, and, ultimately, life and death. Again and again, whether portraying a boy who can change places with his half-coyote dog or a teacher who illuminates the meaning of friendship, Lopez reveals the exterior and the interior, the...

The Road of a Naturalist is a fascinating autobiographical wonder written by one of America's most beloved naturalists at the height of his fame. A scientist, a philosopher, and a poet, Donald Culross Peattie takes us on an confessional journey across the landscape of his life. Told in flashbacks of years past and interspersed with impressions of a journey by motorcar across the American West, the book is intensely...

San Antonio is one of the fastest growing and most dynamic cities in America. The Alamo City's charm, colorful surroundings, and diverse culture combine to make it one of the most interesting places in Texas and the nation. In San Antonio Uncovered, Mark Rybczyk examines some of the city's internationally known legends and lore (including ghost stories) and takes a nostalgic look at landmarks that have disappeared....

If you’re new in town, this book is a no-brainer and will give you a leg up on local history, famous places, and notable characters. If you consider yourself a San... — Rivard Report

In the course of researching dogwood trees, poet and essayist Christopher Merrill realized that a number of formative moments in his life had some connection to the tree named—according to one writer—because its fruit was not fit for a dog. As he approached his sixtieth birthday, Merrill began to compose a self-portrait alongside this tree that, from an early age, he has regarded as a talisman.Dogwoods have never been...

Christopher Merrill has always believed in quests. Over many years and many books he has traveled out, confronting fear, admiring the courage and conviction of others,... — Los Angeles Review of Books

For twenty-five years American Louis Sarno has been recording the polyphonic and hypnotic music of the Bayaka people in Central Africa. His book is a first-person narrative of his life among a hunter-gatherer people and an account of their culture’s extraordinary beauty. Sarno recounts his efforts to protect the Bayakas’ fragile existence in an increasingly destructive world. Song from the Forest has inspired a...

Conveying the deep connection Sarno feels with the Bayaka and their perilously endangered corner of the world. — Independent

From the Memorial Day Miracle to coach Gregg Popovich’s legendary leadership to winning five NBA championships, the San Antonio Spurs have brought excitement to the Alamo City and the greater NBA family since 1976. Celebrating the team with the most rabid and loyal fan base in basketball history, Spurs Nation captures the Spurs’ unforgettable plays and crucial junctures from the past thirty years. Spurs Nation is the...

As the younger generation watches the new crop of players filter in, this chronicle will fill them in on who they have to thank for the caliber of basketball they are... — Rivard Report

During the 1980s and 1990s, the Resource Institute, headed by Jonathan White, held an ongoing series of "floating seminars" aboard a sixty-five-foot schooner, featuring leading thinkers and artists from an array of disciplines. Over a period of ten years, White conducted interviews with the writers, scientists, environmentalists, and poets exploring the human relationship to the wild. The interviews are collected in...

In 1983 writer Jonathan White, founder and president of the Resource Institute, a nonprofit educational organization in Seattle, transformed a dilapidated schooner into a... — Publishers Weekly

In Tides, writer, sailor, and surfer Jonathan White takes readers across the globe to discover the science and spirit of ocean tides. In the Arctic, White shimmies under the ice with an Inuit elder to hunt for mussels in the dark cavities left behind at low tide; in China, he races the Silver Dragon, a twenty-five-foot tidal bore that crashes eighty miles up the Qiantang River; in France, he interviews the monks that...

There’s no mystery to chopping down a tree. But how do you put back together a tree that’s been felled? Mystical instructions are required, and that’s what W. S. Merwin provides in this prose piece. Written with a poet’s grace, an ecologist’s insights, and a Buddhist’s reverence for life, this elegant work describes the difficult, sacred job of reconstructing a tree. Step by step, page by page, with Merwin’s humble...

In his personal anonymity, his strict individuated manner, his defense of the earth, and his heartache at time’s passing, Merwin has become instantly recognizable on the... — Orion

William Carlos Williams emerged alongside Pound, Eliot, Stevens, Frost, and Yeats as one of the foremost poets of the twentieth century. Paterson, Williams's epic masterpiece, raised everyday American speech to the highest levels of poetic imagination. A finalist for the National Book Award and a New York Times Notable Book, William Carlos Williams is a remarkable, rich blend of art and scholarship. From a small-town...

The most laudable aspect of Paul Mariani's critical biography of William Carlos Williams is that it largely succeeds in placing him, in his biographer's words, as ''the... — New York Times Book Review

Writing workshops in prisons and rehabilitation centers have proven time and again to be transformative and empowering for people in need. Halfway houses, hospitals, and shelters are all fertile ground for healing through the imagination and can often mean the difference for inmates and patients between just simply surviving and truly thriving. It is in these settings that teachers and their students need reading that...

Sit down, turn off the phone, and prepare for a stunning, if difficult, read. . . Reading this book is to read the most intimate, often horrifying, stories that humans can... — Publishers Weekly

Writing Architecture considers the process, methods, and value of architecture writing based on Carter Wiseman’s thirty years of personal experience writing, editing, and teaching young architects how to write. This book creatively tackles a problematic issue that Wiseman considers to crucial to successful architecture writing: clarity of thinking and expression. He argues that because we live our lives within the...

Argues that clear communication is integral for successful architecture, since words have an important part in expressing ideas, and because any architect will admit they... — Archidose